I have been reading here for a while getting ideas to make pizza like I had in Southern Italy and the greats in USA (Lombardi's, Patsys, Bianco, etc.) I have a long way to go to make great pizza but I'm getting closer with the help of everyone here.

Ingredients aside, I wanted to be able to get high temp at home without buying an expensive pizza oven that takes hours to heat. Efforts on the grill and home oven produce expected results of flat, tough crust. I decided to buy a Big Green Egg for under $1000 and try it.

My first attempt on my large egg was using a plate setter and a 16" pizza stone. I could not get it past 650 and it fried the gasket. The problem is all the heat builds up beneath the stone and does not get past to the dome. The heat below is so extreme it melted the standard gasket.

BGE sent me a special high temp gasket. I also bought a 14" Fibramat pizza stone thinking the small diameter would allow more heat to reach the dome.

My second time I started the egg without the plate setter or stone and waited until it hit 950 (15 min). Then I put the plate setter and 14" stone in with alum foil under the stone. I'm not sure this is necessary since the plate setter covers at least 90% of the stone. Then I waited until the surface of the stone hit 750 using digital thermo. At this point the dome was around 850 or so. The new gasket was fried but I did not care.

I put in my pizza and it puffed up like I have never seen. I'm used to 6 min. pizzas on my regular BBQ grill so I let the first one go about 2 and half min and it burnt the crust. My second one was perfect in 2 min. Sorry no pictures this time because I was not expecting it to work.

So, done right, the BGE will do the job. There are however some cautions. At those temps the metal band around the egg gets lose so you have to be careful. Also, as I mentioned the gasket will fry so you will need to buy an aftermarket high temp gasket for $15 to solve that problem. But the rest is bliss

ps. I don't know the long term effects on the BGE by using it this way.

I just made a fairly good pizza on my BGE tonight. I'm not sure about temps because I had the thermometer pegged past 700 but the gasket was melting (oh well). I had the plate setter and stone on since I started the fire because I didn't want to thermal shock my cheapo stone. The temp looked like is stabilized at about 625, so I went in the house and set a timer for 20 minutes to let everything heat up. I thew together a pizza with some dough I made 2 days ago with some somewhat local bread flour at around 54% hydration. I had to make it by hand because I don't have a KA yet. Just flour, water and yeast (I'm waiting on a starter from sourdo.com). I used canned whole San Marzanos that I whizzed up with an immersion blender and some fresh mozzarella that's pretty easy to find where I live(St Paul, MN). A little extra virgin olive oil and some fresh basil on last. When I finshed putting it together and my timer was up, I checked the egg and the thermometer had pegged and my gasket was starting to melt. I quick thew on the pizza and set a timer for 2 min. I checked and rotated at 2 min and it was looking pretty good so I let it go for 1 more min. Turned out pretty darn good, the wife liked it too. I'm gonna try to post pics.

I'm using Royal Oak lump from Wal-Mart right now, $5.85 or something for a bag. I have some Wicked Good Charcoal Weekend Warrior blend on reserve for long slow BBQ cooks but I'm getting low and will need to order some more soon, not that the Roal Oak dosen't work but that Wicked Good stuff burns forever. I'm sure you're familar with The Naked Wiz site if you've been to the BGE fourm, he has reviews of most available lump. As far as temp goes, I have no idea , I'll be picking up an IR thermometer one of these days though.

Definitely get an IR thermometer. That is one of the best pies I've seen from a newbie on the board.

Click the globe under my name for a lot of high temp tips.

Jeff

Hey, thanks Jeff. That means a lot coming from you. I sure am a newbie on the board, but truth is I'm not so much a pizza newbie. I spent my youth working at a pizza joint along with my brother and we developed some pretty strong opinions about what pizza should be. We also have one of the few Vera Pizza Napoletana certified establishments right here in St Paul, Punch Neapolitan Pizza. I've been trying to get it right for a few years now and your website is the one that will get me there, a million thanks for that!

I have made a dozen or so pizzas on my BGE in the past couple of years. I'm a novice pizza maker, but I know my way around an egg.

I trashed my stock gasket and now use a Rutland 5/8" flat gray gasket. Look for instructions on The Naked WHiz's web site. They are handy. I haven't had any problems with it thus far, and I don't hae to worry about fried gaskets any more. You can get them at most hearth & grill shops.

I usually run my egg at around 500-600 for thin crusts. I use a BGE pizza stone on the plate setter, so the pizza sits right at lip level for easy sliding and peeling. I always let the temp get stabilized so I don't have too much smoke in the flavor. Cheese soaks up the flavor very easily.

I too am using the Royal Oak lump, with the Weekend Warrior saved for the special times and butts & briskets.

My next venture is to use my cast iron dutch oven to make a Chicago deep dish. Wish me luck!